Damn Daddy! He did it, he pulled me back in.
He was trying to be nice when I walked into the house today for dinner and handing me the listing of a cute little house that he thinks I should buy. Let's forget that there's no way I could qualify for a loan even if the payments would be about 2/3rds of what the rent is on my renter now or that it's kind of in an area I know my roommate doesn't want to live in or that I'm not even sure I want to make such a big purchase.
It makes me feel sad all the same. Because I hate that there are so many can'ts standing in front of me. I hate that I'm watching all of these people around me settle down and get married and buy houses and have kids and I'm . . . not, . . . just stuck in where I am. Not that where I am is bad or anything but . . . it just scores the fact that I'm still aimlessly alone.
My friends like to say that they're still single because they were focusing on their careers, they had other things that they wanted to do. That was never me. Maybe I suffered from a lack of a plan. Betsy wanted to be married before she was 27 and she's going to be. The only vague ideas I ever had never came true so I stopped having vague ideas and rejected having concrete ones.
Sometimes it just seems like I'm the only one not growing up. I'm aging, I'm getting older, but I'm not growing up - I'm still transient, I'm still untied, I'm still around. There is nothing to keep me in this place, in this moment, except for my undying hatred for change. I guess I just want a reason to stay, to be here, to belong.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Off To A Good Start
So, I did it. I made a decision, I made a plan, I made sure too many people knew about it to back down now. My deadline is July 31st. By August I will no longer be agonizing over my query letter - it will be in the mail and I'll just be awaiting rejections as I move on to the next project percolating on my desk.
And it feels good. It's only the second day of my new Plan Of Action (I picture an announcer saying that it in booming, echo-y voice that asserts how important that is - yes, yes, I DO come with sound effects) but so far I've accomplished all the things that I scheduled to do.
The next one's a big one. By Saturday my query letter is going to be done DONE. No more changing or rewriting or brooding - just a best effort, the best I can do.
But this is good for me. In ways I'm very much a planner. I have lists upon lists scrawled on pads of paper, post it notes, - even a book of only to-do lists! - across my desk at work. And they help me remember everything that I need to get done. I've never missed a deadline at work yet and the ones I've had to push back I've pushed weeks ahead of time because if I'm paying attention, I do budget my time well.
So, the key is to remember that just because this isn't the ivory tower with the crazy staircase and the cartoon bosses breathing down my neck and comical emails besieging me every ten minutes, it's still important and a deadline that can't be moved, that needs to be stuck to. If I commit to it, I should be fine.
But then, wrench thrown into the mix, while trying to get my dreams off the ground I'm also throwing a baby shower by my sister-in-law. Wouldn't be such a big deal if I wasn't also trying to finish making her surprise baby quilt that is SO not done and needs to be cause if its not, she ain't getting no present and that won't fly.
Plan, budget time, you'll be fine - that's my new mantra going through my head at all times. Plan, budget time, you'll be fine. Plan, budget time, you'll be fine. Plan . . .
And it feels good. It's only the second day of my new Plan Of Action (I picture an announcer saying that it in booming, echo-y voice that asserts how important that is - yes, yes, I DO come with sound effects) but so far I've accomplished all the things that I scheduled to do.
The next one's a big one. By Saturday my query letter is going to be done DONE. No more changing or rewriting or brooding - just a best effort, the best I can do.
But this is good for me. In ways I'm very much a planner. I have lists upon lists scrawled on pads of paper, post it notes, - even a book of only to-do lists! - across my desk at work. And they help me remember everything that I need to get done. I've never missed a deadline at work yet and the ones I've had to push back I've pushed weeks ahead of time because if I'm paying attention, I do budget my time well.
So, the key is to remember that just because this isn't the ivory tower with the crazy staircase and the cartoon bosses breathing down my neck and comical emails besieging me every ten minutes, it's still important and a deadline that can't be moved, that needs to be stuck to. If I commit to it, I should be fine.
But then, wrench thrown into the mix, while trying to get my dreams off the ground I'm also throwing a baby shower by my sister-in-law. Wouldn't be such a big deal if I wasn't also trying to finish making her surprise baby quilt that is SO not done and needs to be cause if its not, she ain't getting no present and that won't fly.
Plan, budget time, you'll be fine - that's my new mantra going through my head at all times. Plan, budget time, you'll be fine. Plan, budget time, you'll be fine. Plan . . .
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Stuck Between Floors
I hate how I get to the point where I think I've got it all figured out, I know what I need to do next (just take the leap, jump off that cliff and go for it) and then . . . nothing. Anti-climactic much? (Oh, so that's NOT the edge of a cliff just a ledge you can't quite see from this vantage point. Interesting.)
I feel like I'm always on the verge of making a BIG decision and I get that I'm being too preoccupied and weird and just stalling because I'm either afraid that I won't make it or afraid that I will (must be afraid of one but I think I might be afraid of both which is just so useless it makes my ears bleed and then all I can think is how can I put this frustrating contradiction into some character passing by and get it to work - is it bad that I use fictional people as ad hoc therapy?) but then I realize that I'm avoiding making any decisions.
And its not what I want to do. It's not what I NEED to do. And yet, there I am, doing it anyway. Even though I kept saying I was going to start taking the stairs at work everyday it took getting trapped in the elevator (which was pretty much 100% my stupid fault anyway) to get me to actually start with that next step.
So maybe I have to hit the STOP button and get myself stuck in my metaphorical literary elevator. But what does that mean? And do I have the guts to do it - to commit and not turn back and damn all the consequences? If I can get myself to believe it, I know I can persevere and power through and do awesome things. (I've completed NaNoWriMo both times I've tried, I completed most of my senior thesis in 4 hour blocks over 3 weeks and still managed to pump out absuridsm at its best, I wrote a really good novel inspired by a box of fishsticks in the freezer.)
But it's getting myself to believe it that's the hard part. Am I ready to pick up the phone and call for help, no false alarm just a true literary emergency?
I feel like I'm always on the verge of making a BIG decision and I get that I'm being too preoccupied and weird and just stalling because I'm either afraid that I won't make it or afraid that I will (must be afraid of one but I think I might be afraid of both which is just so useless it makes my ears bleed and then all I can think is how can I put this frustrating contradiction into some character passing by and get it to work - is it bad that I use fictional people as ad hoc therapy?) but then I realize that I'm avoiding making any decisions.
And its not what I want to do. It's not what I NEED to do. And yet, there I am, doing it anyway. Even though I kept saying I was going to start taking the stairs at work everyday it took getting trapped in the elevator (which was pretty much 100% my stupid fault anyway) to get me to actually start with that next step.
So maybe I have to hit the STOP button and get myself stuck in my metaphorical literary elevator. But what does that mean? And do I have the guts to do it - to commit and not turn back and damn all the consequences? If I can get myself to believe it, I know I can persevere and power through and do awesome things. (I've completed NaNoWriMo both times I've tried, I completed most of my senior thesis in 4 hour blocks over 3 weeks and still managed to pump out absuridsm at its best, I wrote a really good novel inspired by a box of fishsticks in the freezer.)
But it's getting myself to believe it that's the hard part. Am I ready to pick up the phone and call for help, no false alarm just a true literary emergency?
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